


Morris Saw

by Skittery



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Implied/Referenced Sex, M/M, Power Dynamics, Sexual Content, Sibling Incest, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-28
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-02-19 01:30:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2369441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skittery/pseuds/Skittery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because at that moment, Morris knew.  Because it wasn't a birthmark, not in the usual sense, and it wasn't dirt, or ink, or clotted blood close beneath the surface of his thick skin.  It was a violent pattern of curls and and sharp edges nearly unique that wound itself around a letter M.  The very way Morris's own wound around the letter O.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Morris Saw

It might have been nothing. A smudge of something, dirt, or ink from a pape, or blood; it might have been a bruise. But it wasn't, and even though Morris was young, he wasn't stupid. Morris knew, immediately, like a shock, and he knew that he was the only one who did. He was young, yes, but he saw more. Oscar marched around with his fists up and his elbows out, his eyes sniffing out weakness, his steps heavy and menacing, not caring whose way he got into as long as he was the one who got out on top. Morris's menace was less showy, more internal. Morris noticed things. 

Morris saw. Which was why Morris knew, and Oscar didn't. Why Morris felt like a bright beam of light, brilliant and exposing, was suddenly trained on their every move; and Oscar went on in blissful darkness. Why, when Morris had barged in on Oscar getting dressed that morning, ready to start a since-forgotten argument, getting a look at the inner top of Oscar's right thigh, where he'd never thought to look before, Morris felt his stomach drop to his feet like lead weights, gluing him to his spot in the doorway while Oscar flew over angrily to slam the door in his face, barely missing his fingers. Because at that moment, Morris knew. Because it wasn't a birthmark, not in the usual sense, and it wasn't dirt, or ink, or clotted blood close beneath the surface of his thick skin. It was a violent pattern of curls and and sharp edges nearly unique that wound itself around a letter M. The very way Morris's own wound around the letter O.

And suddenly, things made sense. Growing up, seeing all the others around him noticing their own tattoos, the adult explanations, the letters entwined in patterns, initials, two or three, the other belonging to them, the soulmate. Morris had always assumed that his tattoo, with one letter only, barely intelligible in the harsh pattern, was an anomaly, a great cosmic mistake damning him to eternity alone. His future was an accident, inevitable. And over time, Morris had gotten comfortable with it: alone meant unreliant, self-sufficient; alone meant less emotion and damage and fear of losing; alone meant power. His own tattoo, tucked into the space on his side just below the crease of his arm and shoulder, smaller than most, kept its secret well. While his peers had embarked on great personal journeys to find their fate, Morris stood in the shadows and nursed his wound, his pride, until he was all iron and brick; solid, secret, indestructible.

Until, all at once, he wasn't. It wasn't a cosmic accident after all. A cruel joke, perhaps, but real and tangible, its lines as dark and solid as everyone else's. Only Morris's fate wasn't hidden somewhere out in the far wilds of the world, a personal quest to glory; Morris's was just down the hall of his uncle's house, beside him already, a single letter because the other one would be redundant, unimportant. A single letter because the other letter, the remaining initials, were the same. 

Morris carried it with him: the knowledge, the weight. Years of watching and knowing, filled with crippling uncertainty. Years of watching as Oscar grew older, muscles becoming taut and prominent, strong and fast if still less than observant, feared and controlling. Watching as Oscar began eying girls, always with an air of elitist disinterest that Morris could only hope was genuine. Years of trying to sit far away, to prevent even the tiniest bit of physical contact, shrinking away so that Oscar thought he was afraid of Oscar's strength; slipping as time passed, a small gesture, a brotherly clap on the shoulder, a closer seat. And then joining Oscar as he picked his fights, Oscar cruelly shoving his fists against unwanting boys while Morris held them, wanting.

Waiting and wanting until it became too much for him, like a pot of water boiling against its seal. And then Morris began to seek them out, someone else, a replacement, a substitute; some unsuspecting bright-eyed boy who only saw the hard lines and angles of Morris's body and the hunger in his eyes, and not the pain lingering just below his skin. Morris drew them in with heated glances and subtle touches that turned rough as a soon as they stepped into a dark room or abandoned alleyway. Morris let them touch him, let them feel him out with lips and hands, never letting their lips touch his own, though, saving that, holding onto that at least, trying to lose himself in the sweet, fiery oblivion of it, never quite succeeding. Pressing them up against a wall or floor, hard and empty, digging his fingers and teeth into hair and skin enough to bruise, sometimes, as if by forcing his mark on someone else, he might make the marks between him and Oscar disappear. 

Morris knew he was good at it: these secret, dark rendezvous. He knew from boys with satisfied smiles, who lingered when it was done, who tried once more to kiss him, who came back. But Morris felt nothing,drained, an empty vessel. A trampled paper in the gutter. Morris took out all of his anger, his frustration, his love, even, on these boys whose names he didn't know and didn't ask; and then was left passionless, used up, alone. 

But Morris wasn't alone. And coming home, dark falling, to see Oscar leaning heavily against the open doorframe, a girl hovering under him, speaking animatedly and with familiarity, something in Morris snapped. 

He pushed himself at Oscar, like an arrow to a target, like an angry bullet, hands stretched forward, his palms making contact with Oscar's chest, a thud, catching him off guard and forcing him into the house. Holding Oscar against the wall of the entranceway, thankfully empty, with one firm hand, Morris slammed the door closed behind them, ignoring the startled protestations  
of the girl left out on the sidewalk. Oscar was staring at him, dumbstruck, confused, his face lit dimly by a flickering light in a nearby sconce, his eyes to Morris like pools of unending depth, unexplored, unplotted. Morris was breathing heavily, certain of the choice he was about to make, uncertain of the consequences, unable to choose or even fathom another option, not anymore. He braced Oscar against the weathered flowered wallpaper, forearm pressing against his chest with all the power he could muster, his other hand quickly moving to undo Oscar's belt. Oscar stood numbly still, stronger than Morris, able to throw him off, taken off balance by the abrupt change in situation, by the crazed look in Morris's eyes. 

Oscar started to protest angrily, remembering himself, as Morris roughly pulled Oscar's trousers off him, thrusting them towards the floor. Before he could do anything, though, motions abrupt, angry, unrehearsed, Morris took his free hand and lifted up his own shirt, practically ripping it away from his skin, as though it burned him, revealing the tattoo under his arm that he had taken such pains his whole life to keep secret. Revealing, in a moment, in the same space, the two tangles of indelible and unrequested ink that mirrored each other so closely; the same harsh lines and angles and ties and woven figures surrounding a single, dark letter. 

Silence, for a moment, stillness. The light flickering over faces so similar, one filled with confusion and then realization, the other with thinly veiled hope, readied for disappointment. Stillness. Choked, heavy breathing, slightly out of sync. Morris sighed, relief sweeping over him: even if nothing had changed, it wasn't just his anymore, wasn't his secret, his weight. He lifted his arm slightly away from Oscar's chest, hating to break the contact, let his shirt fall limply back into place. Stillness.

And then suddenly, with the same abruptness that Morris had moved, Oscar made a sound deep in his throat and thrust himself forward, pushing into Morris, grabbing him the way he knew how, the way that would keep Morris from making an escape. Mouth finding Morris's hungrily and, for once, Morris allowing it, not flinching away, but falling into it, falling into the kiss and the lips and the wetness and the light scraping of Oscar's teeth against his own lips, feeling the touch as he had never felt a touch before. Oscar pushed Morris so that Morris was now against the wall, holding him, ripping his shirt away forcibly, the buttons popping uselessly onto the floor, followed closely by the shirt, and Morris's belt. 

As Oscar began working his mouth down Morris's chest, Morris felt a swell of emotion filling him. It wasn't a rejection. It wasn't horror and disbelief and denial. It wasn't a return to emptiness and watching and living through a sheet of heavy glass that blurred and distorted the world and make it less. It wasn't anything Morris had expected, it was more. 

He pulled Oscar back up to face him, and when their eyes met again, Morris knew he wasn't imagining things. This was it. This boy, who he'd grown up with, who he'd watched and wanted and waited for with the harsh pain in his chest, this boy was it and from Oscar's face he could tell he was having the same revelation. The same feeling of how real it was. The same letter. The same. 

"I'm not alone," Oscar said. It was a statement, not a question, firm and certain but not without a tinge of awe. 

Morris, who knew Oscar, who knew that he would never betray a feeling the same way Morris himself kept his emotions down, who knew suddenly that Oscar had spent his life the same way he had, thinking that he alone was all he had, nodded. "This is it." Morris found he could only whisper.

Oscar smiled, and even though he didn't say anything, Morris saw the glint in his eyes, saw into those depths to the scared little boy still hiding within them, lonely and angry and sad. Morris saw the joy that lit Oscar's eyes, even if it was subtle, because Morris noticed things, Morris saw. And when Oscar leaned forward to kiss Morris's lips again, sweeping him into the bliss he had searched for in so many faceless others, Morris knew. It might have been nothing, but it wasn't.

**Author's Note:**

> This seemed like a really interesting AU to apply to this relationship. i'm sorry don't judge me for being Newsies trash...


End file.
